Luvo Ndima - Jama Tours and Shuttles

Luvo Ndima is a man with a mission - to show outsiders the beauty and wonder of the Eastern Province. Ndima - who describes himself as a cultural site guide - started his own company Jama Tours and Shuttles two years ago and has never looked back.

After leaving school Ndima started work as a salesman at a leading fashion retail group before joining Telkom, a job which required him to travel the length and breadth of the Eastern Cape. He soon realised that he was passionate about both people and his province and quit his day job to study tourism, including first aid, and become an accredited tour guide.

Today his customers are both foreigners and visitors from other South African provinces for whom he packages tailor-made tours. He’s a one-man band who gets his sister to come in and do the books. He is determined to never stop learning - even having undertaken a Spanish course!  He is set to go to Germany soon on a fact-finding mission as well as to the US.

He used his initial R125 000 KickStart grant to finance a second vehicle.

What KickStart meant to his business? “Wow, KickStart was a big step. It took me to another whole level in terms of business. The programme taught me valuable lessons about marketing my company as well as about the all important business side.”

KwaDwesi, Port Elizabeth, Eastern Cape / 041 485 0644 / 073 140 0603 / luvo@jamatours.co.za / www.jamatours.co.za

Dinilesizwe Jijana - Lulama Creations

Dinilesizwe Jijana - affectionately known to his family, friends and customers as Dini  - is happy to admit that he is a mother’s boy! It is because it was his mother Lulama, after whom his burgeoning clothing business Lulama Creations is named, who taught him as a young child growing up about sewing, patterns and fabric.

His mother supplemented the family income for 30 years by providing traditional clothes, choir uniforms and tracksuits to communities in the Port Elizabeth area. Just over a year ago Dini joined the business full-time and has seen the business grow by leaps and bounds.

It was 28-year-old Dini’s idea to apply to the SAB’s lauded KickStart programme and he spent the initial grant of R75 000 on sewing equipment. Dini has always had an entrepreneurial spirit. He enrolled for a financial information systems course at the Nelson Mandela Metropolitan University where he started a campus car wash business with a group of friends. The income they received supplemented their study fees. The business also helped Dini to hone his marketing and financial management skills.

At present the company has two full time employees while part-time workers are used when Lulama has bulk orders to complete. Turnover is now more than R16 000 a month.

Dini has big plans for the future: “One day we would like to have our own factory.”

Port Elizabeth, Eastern Cape / 041 487 0466 / 073 820 5955